The FCC International Bureau is seeking comment on Liberty Media’s applications to gain de jure control of Sirius XM. Petitions to deny the application are due Nov. 1, oppositions Nov. 13, and replies Nov. 20, the bureau said in a public notice (http://xrl.us/bnscdb). Liberty filed its application in August after originally seeking de facto control of Sirius (CD Aug 21 p16). Liberty said it owns the equivalent of 47.3 percent of the total outstanding shares of Sirius stock on an as-converted basis, the bureau said. The company plans to own 48 percent of the shares by Oct. 14, the public notice said. Liberty plans to own more than 50 percent of Sirius’s shares within 60 days of commission consent, the company said in its application (http://xrl.us/bnmje4). The bureau granted Liberty’s request for a waiver of the signature requirement on application forms. The bureau found that “little additional probative value would be added by Sirius’ signature,” it said.
Nebraska is asking to opt out of the FCC’s Lifeline accountability database, the Nebraska Public Service Commission told the FCC Monday (http://xrl.us/bnscce). The PSC has “developed a comprehensive system and database that meets all FCC requirements to prevent duplicative federal lifeline support” and pulls in the subscriber data from any eligible carriers who receive federal low-income support, it said. Nebraska’s local procedures should be satisfactory, the PSC said. It pledges to “continually” improve the database and maintain one “as comprehensive and robust” as the FCC’s.
The FCC said it will continue to work with stakeholders from the Association of American Railroads (AAR) to resolve a spectrum use dispute between the group and first responders in the state of Maine, according to a letter released last week (http://xrl.us/bnsb8r). The FCC is considering whether public safety agencies in Maine should be permitted to use additional unassigned spectrum channels which are designated for use by railroads and other industrial entities. Four congressional lawmakers from Maine had previously urged the commission to permit state emergency responders to use the additional spectrum to increase the coverage, reliability and interoperability of the state’s public safety radio communications system. They are: Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, and Democratic Reps. Mike Michaud and Chellie Pingree. FCC Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau Chief David Turetsky said the commission issued an order in July to grant a majority of the state’s waiver requests and would continue to urge AAR to reach a satisfactory resolution “or we will decide the disputed issues if the parties are unable to resolve them.”
The FCC said it supports industry standard voice mail password protections for mobile phones and expressed its concern that some wireless carriers do not adequately inform their consumers about the risks of not securing their voice mail systems. The letter, authored by FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau Chief of Staff Michael Carowitz, was published last week (http://xrl.us/bnsb6x). The letter responded to an inquiry sent by Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., in June requesting that the commission work with wireless carriers to standardize password-protected voice mail practices for mobile phones.
The U.S. Export-Import Bank authorized a $118 million loan to Vietnam for the export of a Lockheed Martin telecommunications satellite. The loan financed $215 million in export sales, the bank said (http://xrl.us/bnsb7d). The satellite Vinasat-2, launched May 15, features a payload of 24 active Ku-band transponders and it provides coverage to Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand, the bank said. The Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Group plans to “satisfy the growing demand of telecommunications and television markets emerging in the region,” it added.
The U.S. Supreme Court declined Monday to hear City Council of the City of Newport News, Virginia, et al. v. T-Mobile Northeast LLC, which came from the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. T-Mobile had hoped to build a wireless communication tower at an elementary school, a request the city denied in a 4-3 council vote “without explanation,” according to the March appeals court records (http://xrl.us/bnsb5w). The appeals decision, which will be upheld, attacked the city’s action for its lack of “substantial evidence” and overturned it, along with an earlier district court ruling affirming the decision. Newport News spokespeople declined to comment.
Tower company SBA Communications completed its acquisition of TowerCo Monday. The sale’s completion gave the company TowerCo’s 3,256 towers in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, SBA said in a news release (http://xrl.us/bnsb32). The company announced the sale in late June, agreeing to pay $1.45 billion in cash and stock for TowerCo. It was SBA’s second major acquisition this year, following its purchase of Mobilitie LLC and its 2,300 towers in February (CD June 27 p8).
Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, will not seek another term as National Republican Congressional Committee chairman and backed NRCC Deputy Chairman Greg Walden, R-Ore., as his replacement, Sessions’ spokeswoman Torrie Miller told us. “It is clear that [Sessions] is not seeking another term since he has openly supported Greg Walden,” Miller said in an email Monday. The next NRCC chairman will be elected by the House Republican Conference after the congressional election in November, an NRCC spokesman said. Observers have speculated about whether Walden would continue as chairman of the House Communications Subcommittee if he’s elected NRCC chairman (CD May 11 p3). A committee spokeswoman would not comment.
Sales of content delivery network (CDN) services will grow threefold in the next five years, reaching $4.63 billion in 2017, Informa Telecoms & Media said in a research report Tuesday. The rise in sales will accompany an overall fivefold increase in global CDN traffic, Informa said. CDNs are essential to ensuring the Internet works by mitigating network congestion and delays, but telecom operators’ deployment of network-based CDNs has contributed to concerns the operators could distort the Internet’s neutrality by prioritizing delivery of some content, Informa said. “The widespread use of traffic-management practices by network operators raises questions about whether the Internet has ever been as open as net-neutrality proponents would like,” Chris Drake, an Informa analyst, said in a news release. “The rise ... of new operator and content-provider CDNs is just the latest illustration of ways in which the Internet is becoming less neutral” (http://xrl.us/bnsbyp).
AT&T sparred with a company called New Talk in a recent hearing before the Texas Public Utility Commission, two Monday briefs show. AT&T Texas has provided New Talk with wholesale resale services for years “that enables New Talk to provide local dial tone service to its end user customers and to generate revenue for itself,” it said. But New Talk “unabashedly continued its practice of ’short-paying’ monthly invoices” and now owes the telco more than $15 million, AT&T said in its brief (http://xrl.us/bnsbuv). New Talk has taken advantage of the interconnection agreement in other ways to receive service without payment, AT&T said. New Talk attempted to “mislead” the PUC and engaged in “outrageous” behavior as well as “illogical” arguments, the telco said. AT&T asked for a ruling that grants the entirety of the $15 million-plus cited and forbids New Talk’s practices. New Talk, in its brief (http://xrl.us/bnsbwk), said AT&T owes New Talk more than $1 million in unhonored promotions. AT&T “refused to provide New Talk with the benefit of certain promotions, has failed to honor its contractual obligations concerning billings during suspension periods, has inaccurately applied late payment charges to lawfully disputed charges, and has made an excessive and unlawful security deposit demand,” the company said. New Talk questioned how AT&T conducted its calculations. The dispute between these companies goes back two years before the Texas PUC.